Finally made up my mind, Marlin X7-VH in .223

[Pulp]

Drove down to Cowboy Guns in New Boston, TX and bought it. I put a Bushnell Banner 4X16 scope on it. Hopefully there will be a range report tomorrow, complete with pictures of one hole 5 shot groups at 1000 yards. Well, there should be a range report anyhow.

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While I've got a bunch of .223 loaded for my Mini-14, tomorrow I'll be shooting a box of Winchester 55 grain SP, just to fireform the brass to my chamber, and use that brass for the Marlin. Is it legal to ask if anybody has an old Lee Loader in .223 for sale? Or do I need to post that question in the classifieds?

Favorite powders? I've got CFE, a little bit of Varget, H-380, H-414, and an old (1973) can of IMR-4198.
I've heard BLC(2) is the cat's meow for .223, but don't have any. I know where some is though.

 

[swampratt]

My friend said he liked H414 in .223
Waiting on range report

 

[Pulp]

Not as good as I hoped, but room for improvement. After I got the scope zeroed I fired a 5 shot group with the factory Winchester, about 3 inch group. My full length resized Mini-14 reloads with Sierra HPBT 55 grain grouped around 1.5, and with Hornady 50 grain V Max around 1.5. No barrel cooling between shots. Six shots to zero the scope, then 15 shots with no cooling time. Both reloads were loaded with CFE, can't remember the weight from work, but it's just about a grain below max. I printed the wrong target and couldn't really see my aiming point very well, so just a better target will help some. For some reason my printer printed a pale yellow instead of a bright red. And I still get tremors in my neck when I bend down into the rifle. I'm wondering if shooting prone instead of from a bench would help. May try that next time.

 

[ASP785]

What twist rate is the barrel?


The only reason I ask is because AA2520 works excellent with the heavier bullets, 69grn+. H335 or AA2230 for the lighter pills. This is from my experience. Don't forget to look at what these guys have to say, they are a lot smarter than I: http://www.6mmbr.com/223Rem.html

 

[Pulp]

It's a 1:9 twist. I'll probably try some heavier bullets in the future.

 

[swampratt]

I never got below 2" groups with my brand new savage 10FP in .308 with my first 150 reloads for that gun.
Figured out it just did not like the 180gr gamekings.
My next loadings were 165 gamekings and she was happy.

Surprised the scope would not let you see the contrast well.
I have been using copy paper and just make a t on it with a fat marker.

I would do a good cleaning for copper etc in the barrel and go have another try at it.
Factory ammo never shot well in my newer guns.
Of course i never would fork money out for the high priced stuff, just winchester, federal or remington cheap box stuff.

 

[Pulp]

"I would do a good cleaning for copper etc in the barrel and go have another try at it."

That's what the CFE is for.

I print my targets from mytargets.com. I usually print the one that has two one inch circles, a red one at the bottom and a green one three inches higher The bottom circle has 4 black squares around it that your crosshairs fit perfectly into. For some reason I printed the one that doesn't have the 4 black blocks, and the red circle came out a very pale yellow. I can't link it from work, company filter won't let me open anything to do with weapons. So we need to quit talking about weapons on this site before the filter picks it up. I can still open this site, the SASS site and a few others. I can no longer visit The High Road from work. Weird.

 

[swampratt]

Some reading for you. some good info some bad. You will never have a powder that eliminates copper fouling completely in my book. That is just going to happen and other residue will also foul the barrel and this sometimes improves accuracy and sometimes hurts it. Sometimes a little fouling helps.
http://www.predatormastersforums.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2193171